A new report from China’s Sinolub predicts steady growth of the Chinese lubes market over the next three years.
The report, entitled “China's Lubricant's Market Trends Forecast Observational Study: 2011” forecasts a steady increase in lubes demand from within the country at around 3.5% annually between now and 2013. The increase is likely to lift China above India as the world’s fastest growing lubes market.
The growth in lubes consumption has given a significant boost to domestic oil production with crude increasing by nearly 30% to a little more than 30m tons since January 2010 and refined product output up nearly 25% at 18.5m tons. Finished lubricant products had already shown significant recovery since the global economic crash, with China’s volume production rising a massive 34.4% from October 2008 to 2009 at 606,000 tons. Although subsequent output increased only modestly (3.2%) the upward trend is set to continue.
Domestic demand couldn’t be entirely satisfied by domestic production, requiring some 237,000 tons of imported lubes, costing the China around $445m, although this was offset by around 100,000 tons of exported product generating £153m in revenue. According to the report, by 2013 the global lubes market should be in surplus by around 7.3-9.1m tons.